Terminal achieves 14-year safety milestone

The Forcados Terminal in the western Niger Delta operated without a significant safety incident between September 2000 and last month, during which 1.25 billion barrels passed through the facility, which is operated by the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) operated Joint Venture.

The safety milestone translates into a daily average of 300 workers handling nearly two export tankers every week.

“This is a significant achievement in a work environment, which involves multi-disciplinary staff teams and contractors,” said SPDC Managing Director and Country Chair, Shell companies in Nigeria, Mr. Mutiu Sunmonu.

“Over the years, SPDC has improved work processes and trained workers, leading to the introduction of the Goal Zero initiative on safety. We’re happy that the improvements continue to manifest not only at Forcados Terminal, but also in other installations,” he added.

Over the past 365 days, a number of high risk maintenance and engineering activities have also taken place at the Forcados Terminal, including rehabilitation of crude oil storage tanks, subsea repairs to the tanker loading system and upgrade to the jetty, among others.

The asset did not record any disruption relating to these multiple concurrent activities, which is also an evidence of the sustained and proactive engagement of the host communities.

The Forcados Terminal was inaugurated in 1971, and was upgraded between 1994 and 1998. The terminal receives, treats, stores and exports crude oil produced by SPDC and other operators in the western Niger Delta, and has an installed storage capacity of 6.3 million barrels.